Defender of the Crown
Platform: Commodore 64
Gametype: Undefined
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Briefing at Robin's and his jolly companions.

Cinemaware's debut on the C64 presents itself as a strategy game peppered with action interludes around the civil war in Middle-Age England. 

It is 1199: The country is divided and reigned by Anglo-Saxon as well as Norman lords. After the murder of the king and the disappearance of the king's crown the situation escalates and both parties equip for an armed conflict about the domination on the island. 

As a source of inspiration served the old Hollywood knight films of the 50s, especially "Ivanhoe" as well as numerous films of the Robin Hood theme. Yonder legendary "Robin of Locksley" also briefs the player at the start of the game about the story and assists you during the campaign. 

The player takes over the role of one of the three Anglo-Saxon lords (the other two are played by the computer) and has to enlarge his at the beginning rather modest realm to get to enough money and military strength. His opponents are three Norman lords who plan exactly the same. The victor is the side, that makes it to eliminate the other by conquering their home castles. 

 Design 
 
There is something wrong in the State of England...

It was promised to be an "interactive movie" and this promise was kept. The game starts with a decent opening, in which programmers, graphics designer and other participants befitting their rank as well as the characters of the game are named, followed by text placards of the story, emphasized with changing music and all kinds of decorative padding. 

The graphics in the game was staggeringly good for 1987, if you claim anything else, you weren't there when the jaws of the whole C64 community hit the ground collectively. Magnificently detailled outdoor views of castles, palaces and tournament places string together. The sword fights inside the castle are brilliant due to the design of the shadows in the background and the hearty smooch scene leaves nothing to be desired. A bit sparse, although completely functional, are the map and the slaughtering scenes. 

The game does work without cryptic or mistakable icons, pure text in the menus make for clarity and clearness. 

Slightly disappointing is on the other hand the music, which is unfortunately only in two voices and tries a bit nasal-squawkingly to imitate the sounds of the Hollywood example. But the authenticity of middle-age sound was not seeked anyway. However, the third voice, which e.g. has been "wasted" on superfluous crunching sounds during the sword fight, could have made for more depth. 

It is also very convenient, that you do not need a single key and the game is completely controlled by joystick. 

May he choose wisely.

You can choose from four different characters, each with a combination of strengths and weaknesses. The choice of the figure leads to a main focus in the later course of the game. So if you plan to win fame and acreage in tournaments, a character with good values in "Joust" can be recommended. If you are more up to robbing hostile gold reserves and freeing fair maidens, look for "Swordplay". 

Wilfred of Ivanhoe

The sunnyboy of all the heroes. Has the same "strength" in everything and is therefore the ideal choice for beginners. 

Cedric of Rotherwood

Dominiates the tournaments in which fame (= more leadership) or acreage (= more gold) can be expected. 

Geoffrey Longsword

Makes it almost every time to the goal in robberies on hostile gold reserves and quasi rescues every abducted dame single-handedly. Fails completely as a general. 

Wolfric the Wild

Well, he is just...hmm...wild? For the advanced player. 

Course of the game 

The game runs in rounds, whereby every round represents one month. You start in October 1199 in one of the three possible starting provinces and with an army of 20 soldiers. First, an overview table is shown, which informs you about the gold reserves, income and the size of the own army, as well as the garrison in the home castle of the player. To survive the upcoming battle of material against the Normans, one cannot avoid to improve oneself in all those categories, as the enemy starts with by far more profitable starting provinces and distinctly better character values as the own side. Furthermore, the computer controlled Anglo-Saxons play anything but aggressive and let the first rounds pass far too passively. There is acute need for action and this of course is left to you. 	 

WRONG: Unmotivated, no army, broke, single and bad hair day. That is not the way!	 
RIGHT: Lots of dough in the bag, huge army, a chic dolly bird. A textbook example of a player.

Map and options menu 
 
The not so good initial situation.

By pressing the fire button the view changes to a map of England which is divided into 19 provinces. Additionally, there is the Sherwood Forest, where Robin Hood stays and which cannot get conquered. The home provinces of the lords are displayed with a castle, a hatchment or a flag show the owner. The own army is symbolized by a black horse symbol. If you lose your home castle, you will drop out of the war, even though you might have conquered other castles already. For the player this means of course "Game over".

At the upper left there is a menu with the six possible actions: 

Hold tournament Host a tournament. 
Conquest: Start a conquest. 
Go raiding: Invade a hostile castle to rob gold. 
Buy army: Enlarge your own army by spending gold. 
Read map: Get information about the province. 
Pass: Let your move pass unused. 

Conquest 
 
Acreage changes the owner.

More land means more income and more military strength. Therefore you need to start immediately to occupy the free provinces. This is done by "Conquest. 

If you choose this option, subitems appear:

With Read map you can at first click on the adjacent provinces to see how much gold and also how many vassals they get you. Vassals are additional soldiers, who automatically join the army of the player who occupies the province first. As soon as a province has been occupied, it cannot give any more vassals. 

But to be able to conquer a province, you first have to transfer at least one soldier of your garrison army from the home castle into the "Campaign army". This is done with Transfer army and of course also works in the opposite direction, i.e. you can also return soldiers from the army in the field to the garrison. 

With Move army the campaign army is finally sent to an adjacant province. If it is neutral or it belongs to a foe, the move now ends and if necessary a fight takes place if a hostile army is there. If the field already belongs to you, you can continue this process until you reach either a hostile or a neutral province. If you move on a province of another Anglo-Saxon Lord, you can decide beforehand to either attack him (and to then have another lord as enemy for the rest of the game) or stay peaceful. 

Fights 
 
A slightly statically-looking clubbing and stabbing breaks out.

So if the own army gets involved in fights, your will be informed: a fighting screen is shown, in which the fighters are represented by single characters. A foot soldier stands for up the 25 soldiers, a rider for up to 10 knights. 

While the fight goes on, you can give commands, that can influence the course of the fight, with the joystick: 

Ferocious Attack: The knights of both sides participate increasedly in the fighting. Gets you advantages, if you have more knights than the enemy. Without effect, if you have no knights. 

Stand and fight: The standard tactic, which minimizes the influence of knights, catapults and the abilities of the leaders. If you are inferior to the enemy in all issues, this is the one with which you do the least wrong. 

Bombard: The catapults of both sides intervene in the fight. Can be worth if you have more catapults than the enemy, without own catapults totally useless. 

Outflank: This gives you significant advantages for the player with the higher Leadership value. 

Retreat: Aborts the fight and you retreat to the nearest province. But if you are isolated or you defend a conquered castle, this means desctruction of your own army. 

Generally you can say, that the player with the higher Leadership value has the better chances in a fight, even though he might be slightly short-handed. A leader with a low value ("weak" or "average") would need an immensely high material superiority, to stand up to an enemy which has a "good" or even a "strong" here. 

Sieges 
 
And if you're not willing, then I'll use force!

The only possibility to remove a leader permanently from the game is to conquer his home castle. For this you need at least a catapult to tear down the walls behind which the garrison is entrenched and by which it has significant advantages in the fight. If you do not succeed to blow a breach, even a manifold short-handed garrison can defend an attack successfully. The catapult is controlled by pulling the joystick backwards, the further, the higher the point of impact of the shot. You have six shots to work on the wall, after that the assault starts. There are three types of ammunition: 

Boulder: You can only damage the walls with heavy boulder projectiles. The first hit needs to be at the pinnacles, the further shots correspondingly lower. The more the wall is torn down, the lower will the defence bonus of the garrison be. 

Disease: Contaminated corpses can be thrown into the castle as soon as you have blown a breach. The earlier you use this type of shots, the more damage it will do to the defenders. 
Greek Fire: Same counts for the Greek Fire, only that it does less damage. 

Robin's help 

If you click onto the Sherwood Forest before an attack on a hostile province, you will get help up to three times from Robin Hood and his men, who make an attack and the defenders before a fight or a siege and make for some losses. This help cannot be requested if you are the target of an attack. 

Go Raiding 
 
Perfectly camouflaged in bright yellow.

With this action you raid a hostile castle in a cloak-and-dagger operation with the aim to rob all the collected gold reserves of the victim. Of course it is good custom that you take part yourself. 

But it is also possible to get further professional help from Robin Hood by clicking on the Sherwood Forest. 

Corresponding to the ability of your own character in the field Swordplay and the help you have maybe called on, you now have a certain amount of energy, shown in a small brown energy bar at the lower left of the screen. 

The own character can be moved with left and right, brought into defence position with up and down and by pressing the fire button you can stab the hostile guards. 

Depending on whether you are successful in defeating the two guards standing between you and the treasure chamber, you can look forward to a warm windfall (IF the treasure chamber was actually filled) or brace yourself for a disgraceful starvation diet in the dungeon. The latter costs next to a ransom also a rank in the field of Leadership, same as also the premature leaving of the fighting area over the left border of the screen. 

Some Norman lords are by the way also very talented in this discipline and are not afraid of paying you back. 

Tournament 
 
Rider sport and Sir Miss-a-lot meet.

To host a tournament ends the own move. It costs at least five gold pieces and is only possible if there was no other tournament in the previous round. All the lords are now called upon to do three rounds with the lance against different enemies. 

In every round the player has the choice whether he wants to fight about fame or acreage. In a duel with acreage as stake, every opponent first chooses the desired province of the enemy, which the victor will then get as a reward. The advantage of a fight about fame is the raising of the Leadership value, if you get champion of the tournament. 

To successfully lift an opponent from the saddle, you steer your own lance to the center of the opponent's shield and press the fire button at the last moment, whereby the required exactness in this manoeuvre depends on the abilities of the participant in the field of Jousting. Tournament specialists as 
Cedric of Rotherwood can easily gain up to three acreages or a raising of the "Leadership" value in a tournament. Weaker lords however, risk a reducing of their Leadership, if they do not defeat at least one opponent.

The disreputable stabbing of the opposing horse gets a total fiasco: you will be taken away all your acreage, lose all your gold and of course your Leadership value will be reduced. 

So you'd better not try this!!! 

Buy Army 
 
Choose your weapons.

With the earned gold from the provinces or raids you can expand your own army, but this ends your move. You can buy the following: 

Soldiers: 

They are the backbone and the cannon fodder of every army. Weak singly, but as a mass they overcome every inferior army very fast, depending on the Leadership value of their leader. They also work as an indispensable protective shield for the expansive knights.

Costs: 1 gold 

Knights: 

The battle tested elite, which can do disastrous harm to the hostile foot soldiers when being behind a protective shield of soldiers. If this shield is missing, they run the risk of getting annihilated fast by a great number of enemies. If this begins to show, the fight needs to be aborted, or you will risk losing these very expensive fighters. 

Costs: 8 gold 

Catapults: 

Mandatory for a siege. They can also create big damage when used in bigger numbers in an open fight on the field, but as they are almost twice as expensive as knights it is rather improbable that one can afford such baubleries. If you can, then the game is already decided anyway. 

Costs: 15 gold 

Castles: 

Serve as mini castles with a garrison of 15 soldiers, which you can build in an especially valuable province. Most of the time it is not worth the trouble, as the attacker mostly runs over them with a bone-crushing superiority. Pure luxury, that you can allow yourself, if you want to waste your gold in the end phase of the game by every trick in the book. If a computer player starts to build castles, this is a sign of utmost danger!

Costs: 20 gold 

Newly bought soldiers, knights and catapults are brought to the garrison on the own home castle and can be fetched there by the campaign army in the following moves. 

Random events 
 
Kitschy as can be: "Is this a sword in your trousers, or are you just happy to see me?"

During the game random events are triggered in irregular intervals, which can have good and bad effects. Some examples: 

The ever-popular tax collector gets robbed and you lose half of your income in this round. 

A province revolts and gets neutral again. 

Maraudering Danish or Wikings pillage the own acreage, which costs gold and soldiers. 

Norman rogues sabotage a catapult. 

The most spectacular and sometimes also decisive event is the robbery of a girl of an allied lord by the Normans. You are given the choice of whether to go out and rescue the poor thing in a daredevil rescue mission or you cowardly hole up and lose a rank at Leadership. If you accept, a Raid is played through, which means the melting of the two princedoms and armies if successful, which in many a precarious situation can save your skin, as the army of the ally now stands ready and available in its home castle. By the way, there is also a small film teaser. 

Solution 
 
And they lived happily ever after...

At the beginning make a fast expansion to the good provinces, if necessary through the area of allied Lords, to collect as man vassals as possible. 

With Read map find out which hostile Lords take part and remember their values for Leadership and Jousting, to avoid unpleasant surprises in battles on the field or in tournaments. If a good or strong Swordplayer is underneath them, do not stash away too much gold, as they like going raiding every now and then. 

As soon as all reachable provinces are allocated, buy soldiers and a catapult and go for the first Norman lord with Robin's help. 

At a siege, shoot the corpses into the castle straight after the first breach has been blown. You should neglect the Greek Fire and damage the wall further instead. 

During the sword fight on the stairs push the guard up to the head of the stairs while being in defence position and then retreat back down while pressing the fire button. If the enemy follows you now, he will get especially many hits and your yourself fewer. 

The game ends, as soon as you have captured all three home castles of the Norman lords. But if an ally makes it to defeat the last enemy, the player will be commanded to a far away village in the province by the newly elected king and the game ends rather inglorious for him. 

Altogether the "allies" are rather double-faced types: if they have reached a certain strength and if they smell the slightest chance to get richer, they will do it and take vacant provinces from the player. If the player blocks the way to an inferior, last Norman lord, they will even attack him in the end phase. Therefore you should give these fellows a short shrift as soon as the greatest danger from the Normans is removed. 

An attack on an Anglo-Saxon lord gets unavoidable, if you have conquered the third Norman castle and at least one of the other two is held by allies. 


Cheats 

When you have conquered a territory and reload the floppy, press H + J + K + L at the same time and you get 1024 knights.  Unfortunately, the source is unknown to me, it stems from my personal (Ludi Purger) cheat collection.

Miscellaneous 

The C64 version contains features as e.g. the battlefield, which could not be implemented on time in the Amiga version, as the game had to be released prematurely due to lack of money. 

Meanwhile several version for PC and common consoles were published under the label Cinemaware. One of them, the "Defender of the Crown - Digitally Remastered Edition", is quasi a 1:1 conversion of the classic C64 version, in which only the old graphics and sounds were refined correspondingly to the better possibilites, the gameplay is almost identical. Another Cinemaware publication named "Robin Hood: Defender of the Crown" has only little in common with the C64 original, except for the story.

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Description from the packaging:

The Age of Chivalry! A time of lusty wenches and black hearted villains. King Richard has been murdered and England thrown into civil war! Amidst the ringing clash of steel and the thunder of charging steeds the bold Saxon knights have chosen you to lead them into battle against the hated Normans. Victory will not come easy. To save England your skills as swordsman and military leader will be severely tested. But should you succeed you'll win the Crown of England and the love of many a beautiful damsel!

Heart pounding action as you rescue your lady from a foul Norman Prison.

Majestic tournaments where you joust for fame, fortune and land.

Heroic battles featuring castle shattering giant catapults!

A unique blend of role playing and strategy combined with dazzling arcade-style sequences.

Easy-to-use mouse or joystick controls. No typing required!


http://www.c64-wiki.com/index.php/Defender_of_the_Crown
